Mild windy weather counters geopolitical tensions

Mixed movement was observed yesterday as day ahead gas prices reacted to mild, windy weather countering geopolitical tensions.

The biggest moves were posted on the prompt, with the Day-ahead contract tumbling 0.41p/kWh when compared to its previous close.

According to data from National Grid, wind generation surged to 10.9 TWh on Wednesday, which was double that seen across the previous gas-day. This coincided with a 48% drop in gas-fired power demand and contributed to a British system that was 14mcm oversupplied on average.

It wasn’t plain sailing however with plenty of intra-day volatility, possibly due to extended Norwegian capacity restrictions. Data from offshore operator Gassco shows that unplanned maintenance combined to remove 33.3mcm throughout the gas-day, although the two outages appear to be resolved as of this morning. Lower Norwegian volumes possibly helped to prop up near curve contracts, which posted day-on-day gains of circa 0.03p/kWh.

This morning, most contracts have opened in softer territory with the Summer 24 front-season contract currently being offered circa 0.1p/kWh below its previous settlement at time of writing.

If we check the latest half hourly period today (09:30 – 10.00), 37.06% of the total electricity being generated in the UK is coming from wind generation, down from 48% on average yesterday morning. Electricity from gas currently accounts for 20.97% of generation, up from just 8% yesterday.

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